Tallahassee Gets a Tesla Supercharger Station

If your weekend travels takes you to the northeast part of town and by Village Square Shopping Center, you will notice a Tesla supercharger station.

The futuristic looking station has been under construction for a couple of weeks. The station is located strategically near Interstate – 10 and will serve as another piece of the Tesla re-charging network.

Currently, Florida has 12 Tesla Supercharger stations with the closest to Tallahassee located in Lake City.

Tesla Supercharger Station at Village Square Shopping Center

The station can also serve Tesla automobile owners here in Tallahassee.

The station will accommodate 6 Tesla cars at one time.

Based on Tesla’s website, Tesla Motors was founded in 2003 by a group of engineers in Silicon Valley who wanted to prove that electric cars could be better than gasoline-powered cars. In 2012, Tesla launched Model S, the world’s first premium electric sedan.

Tesla has more than 50,000 vehicles on the road worldwide. Tesla owners have the benefit of charging at their home so they never have to visit a gas station or spend a cent on gasoline.

For long distance journeys, Tesla’s Supercharger network provides convenient and free access to high speed charging, replenishing half a charge in as little as 20 minutes. Superchargers now connect popular routes in North America, Europe, and Asia Pacific.

The station in Tallahassee is connected to the City of Tallahassee electric utility grid. The site houses hardware which “transforms” electricity from the grid into a form which can rapidly recharge Tesla automobiles.

15 Responses to "Tallahassee Gets a Tesla Supercharger Station"

To recharge is free it takes about 30 minutes. To just change the battery for a fully charged one is $35 – $40 I can’t exactly remember and takes around 3 minutes. The vehicle can go up to 400 miles on one charge.

On Saturday, I drove my Model S down from Atlanta to go to Alligator Point. I stopped and used a Tesla supercharger in Tifton, GA for 30 minutes recharging my battery. The supercharger is located right next to a Starbucks so a restroom and a coffee were quite handy. I stopped by the Tallahassee supercharger to check to see how construction was coming along (almost complete) and then continued on down to the beach. Then charging at the beach is as simple as plugging your car into the wall. Superchargers are free for life and electricity is regulated unlike gas. I have never been happier with my car purchase. On top of that, it drives awesome.

The Model S must be driven to be believed. It is the best car ever built. Had mine since 2012 and nothing can compare. You can drive on sunshine and help save the planet. I love zipping around in my car knowing it is a clean machine that can outrun most folks easily. It keeps me away from the herds. ?? Take a test drive, you will become obsessed with owning one. I want to try out the P85D with dual motors!

Tesla Motors pays taxes on expenses related to the charger. There is no tax incentive for building a supercharger, but property owners generally do not get paid for the land in exchange for having well-healed Tesla drivers stop at their burger joint for 15 minutes or more while charging.

Tesla owners pay $2000 with the car to enable supercharging, which is “free” for life. For most users, Tesla makes money on that deal because you have to drive 40,000 miles on supercharger power to amortize that $2000 option. Most charging is done at home.

Tesla still pays for the electricity.
It is a net positive for taxpayers.

As George pointed out, Tesla pays for everything. While often property owners don’t charge Tesla rent for the space, this is a freely entered agreement between two private parities. Tesla gets use of the space, and the property owner gets the additional traffic (pun intended) of well to do shoppers ready to spend money at the shops at the shopping mall.

Tesla pays for the electricity at market rates. As Tesla is focused on building out the supercharger network quickly, they are just installing the SuperChargers themselves that connect to the grid and use power from the utility. In the future, SuperCharger stations, will have canopies with solar panels and battery package so they can provide most, if not all, of the power to its customers using free solar panels. Again, the solar panels and batteries to store power for nighttime charging will be paid for by Tesla, not the tax payer.

Because the operating costs of the SuperCharger will eventually be much lower once the solar panels are in place, they can afford to provide free charging to its customers.

One of the parties on this web stated a 400 mile range for the Tesla. I question that accuracy. Another question is , this vehicle has a ton of batteries beneath the floor that in the event of an accident where the system shorts out on frame rails, just how does the rescue team deal with this dangerious situation?? I heard the fire dept. folks approach the vehicle with grounding cables ?